FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT VIOLIN - PAGE 5

Caryn Lin began taking violin lessons at the age of 9, and from that point on it seemed apparent she would be performing on that instrument for many years. "I just wasn't able to think of anything else I wanted to do with my life," she said. What she ended up doing with the violin is not quite what she or her parents had in mind as she progressed with her studies. Lin's education included studying with Philadelphia Orchestra violinist Larry Grika, a degree in violin performance from Northwestern University, and sessions with German violin virtuoso Susanne Lautenbacher.

Emile Gogineni was in first grade when he decided he wanted to be a violinist, but his mother, April Gogineni, had other ideas. "She wanted me to play the piano, but I didn't want to," Emile said. "I knew I wanted to play the violin ever since I heard a violin performance at school. I convinced her when I was in second grade. " Now 10, Emile is the youngest member of the Philadelphia Young Artists Orchestra, said the conductor, Louis Scaglione. The orchestra is scheduled to perform at 7:30 p.m. Feb. 15 at Valley Forge Military Academy.

A glance at the audience that turned out to hear Itzhak Perlman on Thursday night at the Academy of Music spoke volumes about his career, which this month entered its 30th year. There, you think, is an older, fur-clad woman who might have seen him on The Ed Sullivan Show. Over there is a teenager in cutoff shorts and a ski cap who probably first heard Perlman's name from Big Bird. And everywhere, it's safe to assume, are Republicans who remember him fondly as a White House pet of Ronald Reagan's.

A one-composer concert - like the one violinist Young Uck Kim and pianist Christoph Eschenbach played for the Philadelphia Chamber Music Society Saturday night at the Port of History Museum - runs the risk of monotony, even if the composer is the sublime Mozart. Kim and Eschenbach averted that risk through skill, poise - not even a creaking door in the balcony, which interrupted the first piece, ruffled them for long - and careful programming. There were four works on the program - the violin sonatas in C major (K. 296)

Lolita of the lagoon? Stella Maris? Venus of the vibrato? What to name Vanessa-Mae, the 17-year-old violinist who leads her band into the Theater of the Living Arts tomorrow night? Naming is crucial, if the buzz around this new face in the crowd of young violin virtuosi can be measured. Is she the intense concert artist whose recordings include the compulsory Bach, Brahms, Beethoven, Bruch repertoire? Is she the pop artist with a sea-drenched music video, her eyes penetrating yours over the white electric violin, her body shouting "Oooh!"

Ridge Park Elementary School Principal John Canterbury stood tall - but had a sheepish grin on his face - as he put the foot-long, toy-size violin under his chin. The 200 or so children watching him howled with laughter to see a grown man saw away at the little fiddle. He was joined by two student volunteers playing small violins and by a professional string quartet. "This is what the children like," said music teacher Jeanneane Bazzelli as she watched the performance Tuesday morning.

The vast breadth of music makes the presence of special interest groups doubly important. The Delius Society has, for years, argued musically for attention to English composers overshadowed by more fashionable, luckier or simply better promoted ones. In the program Wednesday at the Free Library, four musicians performed works by friends of Frederick Delius, then closed with what was believed to be the first local performance of Delius' Double Concerto in an arrangement by Roger Quilter.

The sounds of music entranced more than 300 students at King's Highway Elementary School in Coatesville last Thursday. Members of the quartet Strings for Schools gave the pupils a program of note - a hands-on introduction to the violin, the cello and other string instruments. Whether they inspired a budding Paganini, Heifetz or Casals remains to be seen, or heard.

Zakir Hussain, the Indian drum master who appeared with violinist L. Shankar on Saturday at an overflowing Painted Bride Art Center, is one of the most imaginative percussionists around. In a solo setting, accompanying Shankar or in duets with South Indian percussionist Trichy Sankaran, Hussain infused his work with an impressive technique, control and sense of humor. He hears things no one else does, then reproduces those sounds beautifully, his fingers driven by the computer in his head.

One day a week, Feasterville is the home of the Alexander String Quartet. That is the day that the five-year-old international performing ensemble and winner of the Portsmouth Competition gathers at the home of the second violinist, Kate Ransom, to rehearse. The other days, the group works on Manhattan's Upper West Side, where violaist Paul Yarbrough lives in a building with ample basement space and where, Ransom explains, "the neighbors are friendly. It's an amazing crowd - they have heard the program we (will)